Top 10 business Web sites

We all have our favorite cyber-spots for information. Here are some that our Leading Edge firms are recommending you visit to stay on top of the latest business news and information.

www.ceoexpress.com is more of a portal with links to all sorts of business sites—media outlets, financial sources, search engines, etc. It's also possible to select the Industry Center link near the bottom of the page to find information on specific topics, such as human resources, health care, marketing, finance and more.

www.cpa2biz.com is a great resource for information on subjects such as auditing, business valuations, information technology and tax. It's linked to the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), which also has valuable news on the latest in the accounting industry at www.aicpa.org.

www.techrepublic.com is a useful IT-related site. It also has lots of e-newsletters with practical advice, including worksheets for assessing IT inventory and needs. Other solid IT-related sites are ZDNet (www.zdnet.com) and PC Magazine (www.pcmag.com). Both are valuable for research, downloads, reviews and news.

www.shrm.org contains the very latest on human-resource issues. It has relevant information on what's new in the industry as well as practical information on performance reviews, compensation packages, flexible benefits programs, etc.

www.taxsites.com has information on taxes, including forms, research and links to more tax-related and accounting sites.

www.federalreserve.gov/releases/H10/hist will give you the latest on foreign exchange rates as well as historical data.

www.search.com is a metasearch engine, which provides better results with a minimum of time invested.

www.irs.gov is the place to go when you need information on regulations, forms or publications and filing deadlines and extensions.

www.m-w.com may sound too obvious, but it's a great tool for checking spelling and usage. It has a thesaurus and you can even find a word in 230 different languages.

www.policyworks.gov/org/main/mt/homepage/mtt/perdiem/travel.shtml gives you the IRS per diem travel amounts for anywhere in the world.

Of course there are many more reliable sites. Some of the best are news sites, such as the Wall Street Journal (www.wsj.com) or CNN (www.cnn.com). And don't forget your local newspaper. Rena Goodmiller, marketing manager at Henry & Horne PLC in Tempe, Ariz., says she relies on the e-mail newsletters from her daily paper.

If you have business Web sites that are useful to you and may benefit others, please share them with us at www.leadingedgealliance.com. e